Chapter Text
Tad did not wear a turquoise suit to the wedding like Adam feared. Instead he wore charcoal, like the rest of them did. Gansey’s mother had insisted they each wear a boutonniere in blending shades of coral and sunset, the wedding colors Adam was almost positive Blue did not agree to, and it was all very pleasing to the eye. Ronan did not enjoy wearing the suit but Adam very much enjoyed Ronan wearing the suit, which he explained in great detail to the man in a random supply closet before the wedding began.
When Tad ripped the door open, looking thoroughly unamused to see Adam with his shirt completely unbuttoned and Ronan’s hands tucked into his slacks, Adam thought it was jealousy that made Tad’s eyes narrow. It was not jealousy, in fact.
It was the fact that Gansey had fucking disappeared and Tad couldn’t find him and they’d chosen now, of all times, to have a quickie?
There was only an hour left until the wedding at this point. Adam stood in the closet, dazed, only vaguely aware that Ronan was buttoning his shirt for him and cursing under his breath. Adam could only think of Blue - who he’d peeked on earlier, looking beautiful in a dress hand-sewn by Orla that didn’t match the polished look up of the reception hall at all - and how nervous she was to walk down the aisle in front of so many strangers.
And Gansey was missing?
Tad said he was going to drive around the area and hustled off. Ronan tugged Adam in the opposite direction as Adam asked, “Is this-- I’m confused. Why would he leave?”
“He’s probably freaking out. Maybe a panic attack. We need to find him.”
“Gansey?”
Ronan leveled his gaze at Adam, and oh, of course. Adam had his ideas about Gansey - his beliefs, his notions, his prejudices - and he thought he’d made great progress in letting those go. Still, there were moments where they still crept in on him, like now. Hadn’t Gansey been the one to talk Adam down from a panic attack all those months ago? Wasn’t he the one who knew the tricks to stay focused and calm?
How would he know that without having gone through it himself?
They searched the church together, but when fifteen minutes passed without finding him, it became apparent they needed to split up. The wedding was at a church in DC - despite no one from either side being religious, though the Ganseys insisted for tradition’s sake - and had very few rooms inside to hide. There was a small bridal suite, an office for the groomsmen, and maybe two or three small rooms dedicated for bathrooms. Ronan decided to search the church garden.
Adam was tasked with staying at the church, partly in case Gansey returned, but more importantly, as a way to distract Blue if she asked questions. He was fulfilling the latter duties in the church’s kitchen by fetching Blue a small snack when he heard a bump near the cupboards.
It was Gansey. Tucked into a cupboard small enough that Gansey had to pull his knees to his chest to fit.
“Oh, hello Adam,” Gansey said, voice eerily chipper. His face was darkened by the shadows of the cupboard, but Adam thought he looked pale. (At the very least he looked less like a bronzed god and more like a normal human, which in itself seemed worrisome.) There was sweat clinging to the crown of his forehead.
Adam didn’t know what to say. His mouth hung open as he stared, rather helplessly, at Gansey. Eventually, Adam sputtered, “What are you doing here?”
Gansey looked around the cupboard thoughtfully, lips sucked tightly into his mouth. “Oh, yes. Well. This just seemed like a nice place to relax.”
“The cupboard?”
“Yes.”
Adam waited for Gansey. Gansey stared back at Adam, lips stretched too tight into a smile. His fingers were tapping furiously at his thighs.
Adam sighed. “Gansey.”
“I’ll be okay!” Gansey’s voice was a little too high. His next words tumbled out of him too fast. “It’s nothing really. I just was thinking about the wedding and Blue and all those people. And being married. And I thought how much I loved Blue and I just got a little overwhelmed, so I went to get some water, and then I saw this cupboard and I thought, ‘Wow, I wonder if I could fit in it,’ and so I tested it out to see and wouldn’t you know--”
Adam reached forward and pressed two fingers to Gansey’s neck, searching for a pulse. It was beating wildly. The touch seemed to shock Gansey into silence. It took at least ten seconds for Adam to realize that it had also caused Gansey to stop breathing.
“You need to breathe,” Adam said gently. He held up his hand and started counting. “Inhale for one…two...three...four… Gansey, you can do this, okay? Inhale. Okay, good. Now exhale. One...two...three...four…”
Gansey handled his panic attacks differently from Adam; that became abundantly clear. If you weren’t looking carefully enough, one might not even notice Gansey was having a panic attack. He smiled through the whole thing, making sure to nod in response to anything Adam asked, but his eyes were distant. Empty. Adam forced Gansey to breathe until the smile dripped off his face, until Gansey was gnawing at his lips.
Adam wished Ronan were here. The two of them had been friends longer and Ronan had experience talking Gansey through panic attacks. Adam felt woefully unprepared.
“You have nothing to worry about, Gansey,” Adam said eventually, lowering his voice to a whisper. No one was around but it felt necessary. “You love Blue. You said it yourself. You’re going to be so happy with her, I promise.”
It was apparently the wrong thing to say. Gansey pressed his fingers into his face, as if he were trying to claw the skin away, and exhaled rough. “No, no, it’s not that. It has nothing to do with my happiness.”
Adam took Gansey’s hands from his face and held tightly onto his fingers. He didn’t think Gansey would hurt himself, but seeing that he’d be starring in a million photos soon, Adam didn’t think Mrs. Gansey would appreciate even the smallest of scratches.
“Do you want to talk about it?” Adam asked.
Gansey leaned his head against the back of the cupboard and closed his eyes. It was a very long time before Gansey said, voice so steady that it took some time for Adam to realize he’d said something important: “I have PTSD.”
Adam did not know this. He was tempted, momentarily, to ask, What from? but years of people digging into his own trauma taught him that there was no point in asking; the answer was never something you could sum up in a few words, let alone in the aftermath of a panic attack. Instead, Adam said, “I’m sorry.”
“It’s gotten worse since the engagement. I don’t know why. Maybe just the stress-- and my mother and-- well,” Gansey pinched the bridge of his nose. “It keeps happening.”
“If it’s triggered by the wedding then it should get a little better, now that it’s almost over. Right?”
“Probably. But-- I just… I’m not so sure this is a good idea anymore.”
Gansey still had his eyes shut. Adam was grateful because, abruptly, he couldn’t keep the look of contempt off his face. He could only think of Blue, in her wedding suite, buzzing with energy, saying, Adam, I’m so ready to just be married. Was Gansey really thinking of canceling the wedding? Now? Blue would be humiliated.
Before his anger could rear its head, Gansey, in a tone Adam had never heard from him - feeble and broken - said, “What kind of person would I be to let her marry me? I can’t keep my shit together and it’s just a big party. What will I be like if something serious happens? I can’t-- I can’t do that to her.”
“She loves you,” Adam said.
Again, Adam’s words seemed to only upset him further. Gansey covered his face with his hands and tensed his shoulders, pulling himself tighter into a ball. “I know. And it’s blinded her. She doesn’t realize that this is what our entire lives will be like. I’ve made her cry so much the past couple months and I can’t do that to her, Adam. I can’t let her go through life--”
“Hey, Gansey, no. No. ”
There was not enough room for both of them in that cupboard but Adam didn’t care. He pushed himself as far into it as he could, knees bumping awkwardly against the sides. Adam was surprised Gansey felt safer in this tight space because it felt constricting and suffocating to him, but Gansey seemed to fractionally relax the tighter the space became.
“Blue loves you,” Adam repeated, more firmly this time. When Gansey made the motion to respond, Adam added, “Let’s be real, Gansey: has Blue ever done anything she doesn’t want to do?”
“No, but--”
“Right. No ‘buts’ - end it there. She doesn’t. She never will.” Adam placed his hand on Gansey’s shoulder and squeezed. “Look, I-- I understand why you’re worried. I know it’s hard to imagine that someone could be happy with you when everything feels so fucked up and messy and… dark. But they can.”
Gansey shut his eyes and inhaled quickly through his nose. It sounded so loud when they were trapped in the cupboard.
“But is it fair, Adam?” Gansey asked finally. “If I know that this will be in my life, if it’s always going to be a fight I’m losing, is it fair for me to ask her to go to battle with me every time?”
“Who says you’re losing?”
“I’m in a cupboard having a panic attack. On my wedding day. I’m definitely losing.”
“But you haven’t lost,” Adam countered. “Gansey, you deserve love. We all do, whether our brains are a little broken or whether we have to fight battles that we might never win.”
“But it isn’t fair--”
“Maybe it’s not, but it doesn’t matter, because you’re marrying someone who has made the choice to marry you and support you all on her own. And you have to trust her decision, Gansey.” Adam fiddled with his fingers, popping his knuckles. “I understand why it’s hard. With all my shit-- well, I know what I can handle, and ultimately I know I can survive. And it’s been an adjustment to be with Ronan, to realize that I can’t just-- I can’t keep doing things all by myself, that me just surviving isn’t good enough. I worry all the fucking time whether I’m too much for him, or whether my baggage will get too heavy for him.
“But I know he’d tell me if it did. And I have to trust that.”
Gansey pinched the bridge of his nose. “And if it does get too much? Don’t you worry about that, too?”
“Me? Worry? Doesn’t sound like me.”
Gansey groaned. “Adam, I’m being serious.”
“It’s because I don’t know, Gansey. I don’t know what I’ll do if that happens. But life has a way of happening, no matter how much you think about it, so I might as well do what makes me happy and trust Ronan will do the same.”
Gansey fell silent. Adam’s neck and back were screaming at him to get out of the cupboard but he stayed there, knowing Gansey needed time to decompress. Eventually they left and headed back to the almost equally small room designated for the groomsmen, where Adam readjusted Gansey’s tie and boutonniere and forced him to drink a Gatorade. With Gansey’s permission Adam texted Tad and Ronan to come back.
Tad arrived first. Adam worried he would say something inappropriate, but Tad surprised him by taking one look at Gansey and offering a fistbump.
“You’ve got this, man,” Tad said.
By the time Ronan arrived Gansey was back to himself, or at least the version he presented to everyone else. Ronan pulled Adam aside to privately ask him about it. In an attempt to be subtle about it, he offered to fix Adam’s tie and pulled him outside the room. (Though it clearly failed, based on Tad’s loud snort that trailed through the door.)
“What happened?” Ronan asked. His fingers slid to Adam’s tie to keep up appearances. Or maybe just to touch him. The latter seemed more likely, as they’d done nothing but touch one another the past few months. “Is Gansey okay?”
“He was in the kitchen,” Adam said. He didn’t see the point in lying to Ronan, not when he already knew Gansey’s secrets, but it felt unnecessarily cruel to add that he found him in a cupboard. “We talked. He’ll be okay.”
Ronan peered at Adam carefully. As usual, he had seen something in Adam that made him pause. Ronan’s hand trailed down the silk of Adam’s tie until it fell at his side, twitching nervously.
“And you?” Ronan licked his bottom lip. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah.” Adam squeezed his boyfriend’s hand. “I really am.”
Blue and Gansey got married. Their vows were perfect - Blue’s the perfect match of cynicism and honesty, Gansey’s charming and vaguely self-deprecating - and the tiny ring-bearer, one of Blue’s little cousins, shrieked loudly when they kissed, leaving the entire church chuckling in delight.
Ronan’s speech was short. It included only two F-bombs, neither of which were supposed to be there, and Adam saw Mrs. Gansey cross her heart at each one. Still, Gansey and Blue seemed to enjoy it, which was all that mattered. Adam took one small sip of champagne for each toast and let that be the only alcohol he touched all night.
Adam successfully pulled Ronan to the dancefloor only two times. The first one only happened after Tad had asked Adam to dance, whereupon Tad’s hand slipped a little lower than necessary. Ronan was there quickly, shoving Tad away and muttering under his breath about “the audacity of some people” and “mother fucker thinks he’s so sly.”
“How much longer do we have to stay?” Ronan whispered into Adam’s ear as they danced.
“I think it’s our job to help clean up after.”
“Fuck that. We spent all morning setting up!”
“How are you hundreds of years old and you’ve never been in a wedding party before? This is standard procedure.”
Ronan groaned in his ear. Adam found it unnecessarily rude of him and, in retaliation, whispered everything he planned to do to Ronan in their fancy suite that night. (Which only backfired, in the end, because Adam got himself too worked up and Ronan found it hilarious.)
Gansey and Blue took off around nine, and the wedding wrapped up shortly after. True to the schedule, they were both pulled into the clean-up efforts. Ronan played nice for an hour, until Mrs. Gansey asked them both to carry the vases out to her car. Once they were safely tucked inside, Ronan took Adam by the hand and pulled him around the back of the venue instead of going back inside.
“The key to our room is in my jacket, which is back in the reception hall,” Adam warned.
“Who says we’re going to the hotel?”
“Oh, did Cabeswater make it after all?” Adam joked.
It did. The forest was behind the venue waiting patiently for them. By this point in the year the weather had turned, making it almost impossible to stay outside without a jacket for long. Cabeswater, however, welcomed them with figurative open arms, making sure it was warm and dimly lit despite the evening hour.
Adam reached up to the branches in a silent thank you, twisting his fingers through the vines. They tightened around his hand.
The truth was, as much as Adam wanted to take Ronan’s elaborate suit off his body piece by piece, Cabeswater wasn’t an ideal place to have sex. Ignoring the obvious factors like twigs and dirt and the like, Cabeswater had enough personality that Adam always felt like someone was watching them.
Still, he didn’t mind sitting cross legged across from Ronan and kissing him slowly. Cabeswater had let a sliver of moonlight fall over them and it felt too romantic to pass up.
Eventually Ronan dragged his lips to Adam’s jaw and said, “You know, you promised me one of these things a while ago. When’s my wedding?”
Adam laughed. “Do you want something like this?”
“Fuck no.” Ronan placed his lips on Adam’s throat this time and let them linger before he said, “I just want you.”
“We can make it official whenever,” Adam said. He was finding it hard to concentrate when Ronan kissed him so delicately but in places decidedly intimate. “But we do… Need to talk about this first.”
Ronan pulled away to look where Adam was pointing. When he saw he meant Cabeswater, Ronan sighed. “I know.”
“You don’t have to do it, you know,” Adam whispered. “I love Cabeswater. It’s sweet and it loves us both and the idea of destroying it--”
“I know. But I think it knows. It’s ready. It brought you to me, after all, so it had to know…”
“Are you sure you want to, though? It’s not just about Cabeswater, Ronan. If you do this-- I mean, you’re throwing away your life for me. Literally.”
Ronan tucked a strand of Adam’s hair behind his ear and smiled. “That part doesn’t worry me at all, okay? I’m ready. I want to grow old with you and all that gross shit.”
“Ronan--”
“I’m serious. I’ve had years to think about this, Adam. Anyway, it’s…time. I’d want this even if you weren’t in the picture. Matthew is gone, Declan and Henry won’t last much longer. Gansey and Blue will only live for so long. I’m tired of people growing old and leaving me. For once I want to grow up with people.”
Adam resisted the urge to sigh. Truthfully, he was terrified at the idea of Ronan destroying Cabeswater. There was so much room for Ronan to regret his decision, for him to grow old and bitter toward Adam. And like Gansey said, what if Ronan found Adam too much? What if he felt obligated to stay with Adam because he’d made such a huge sacrifice?
Ronan must have sensed his worry because he leaned forward and cupped Adam’s cheeks in his hands. “I love you.”
“I just don’t-- I don’t want to rush the decision,” Adam said finally. “I want you to think carefully about it. I know you’ve probably done nothing but think about it this whole time, but you weren’t actually with me during the past 70 years.”
“Adam. I love you.” Ronan kissed Adam at his cheekbone. “I’m not worried.”
Adam let Ronan kiss him in an effort to get rid of his dark thoughts. His therapist might argue it wasn’t the healthiest of coping mechanisms, but God did it work. Ronan was intoxicating.
“We can wait, it’s fine,” Ronan said eventually. “Though I want to do it before you turn 26.”
That left only about eight months. Adam asked, “Why?”
Ronan shot Cabeswater a sly look. “Well, it makes sense, doesn’t it? Why Cabeswater stopped my age at 25? That’s the age we finally got to be together.”
Adam hadn’t thought of that and the realization took him aback. He laughed, a little breathless, and stared up into Cabeswater’s branches. There was no wind but they swung toward him, gracefully arching through the air in a way that made him think of Ronan’s laughter.
“See? It was always Cabeswater. Or the universe, or fate. Whatever you want to call it,” Ronan whispered. He ran his nose along Adam’s jaw and sighed happily. “There was always a plan for you and me to be together.”
Adam closed his eyes, happy to be given such attention by both Ronan and Cabeswater. He felt so completely warm and perfect where he was - Ronan humming in his ear, the rustle of Cabeswater’s leaves echoing in his deaf ear - and it was almost overwhelming to think that this had been the plan all along. That the road he took, the road which was so long and so painful, all led to this.
If fate were real - and it seemed to be it made the journey worth it. Because it wasn’t just about Ronan. It was Blue and it was Gansey, too, and more than anything, it was happiness. The universe wanted Adam to be happy.
But--
Adam wanted himself to be happy, and that seemed important to note, too. He voiced this to Ronan, whispering, “It might be fate. But I think it was just as much my choice. And your choice. Everything, really, was a choice we made. You made a choice to forgive me for leaving, to trust me again, to wait for me. I made a choice to not go back, which finally led me to you.”
Adam slipped his fingers into Ronan’s and smiled down at their joined hands. “I’m willing to believe that there are higher powers at play here. But I don’t want to discount that we worked very hard to get to this place. That there were so many moments that we could have said it was too hard but we didn’t. We made the choice to fight, and I think that’s important, too.”
Ronan squeezed his hand. “I’m always going to choose you. I want you to know that.”
“Don’t do that,” Adam breathed. “Choose happiness, okay?”
Ronan pulled back and looked at Adam in that careful way of his. The one that pulled Adam apart, piece by piece, sometimes in ways that were too much but often, in nights like this, just the right amount.
Eventually he said, “Okay. I promise I’ll always choose happiness. But you should know, Adam, that happiness is always going to be you. Every time.”
Adam leaned forward and kissed Ronan.
“I can live with that.”